SECTION VII.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL

A. Some English Libraries

See: the article on Libraries in the Encyclopedia Britannica; Edwards' Memoirs of Libraries, London 1859; Madan, Books in Manuscript, London 1893; Rye's Records and Record-Searching, London 1897; Garnett's Essays in Librarianship and Bibliography, London 1899; Fletcher's English Book-Collectors, London 1902; Quaritch's Dictionary of English Book-Collectors, in progress; Macray's Annals of the Bodleian Library, Oxford 1890; Bradshaw's Collected Papers, Cambridge 1889; Sinker's Library of Trinity College, Cambridge 1891.

Catalogues of MSS and printed books, where of value to Chaucerian students, are mentioned below or under the sections on manuscripts, III B and IV A here.

Photographic reproductions may be arranged for in Oxford through the Photographic Department of the Oxford University Press. The lat est mode of reproduction, the Rotary Bromide (white on black), is less expensive than the usual print or than the employment of copyists; it costs, for work done in Oxford, a single page or ope..ing 11 by 9 inches, one and fourpence; for same 8% by 54 inches, eightpence. The University Press can also execute work at the British Museum or in Cambridge, for which special arrangement must be made; or photographs can be taken, at the Museum, by artists known to the administration. In all cases permission must be obtained by written application, which must specify the page or pages to be reproduced. For further notes on photography in foreign libraries see Nation 1908 I: 214, 258. Admission to the various libraries is discussed below.

The Library of the British Museum. This library, belonging to the nation, and housed in the Museum building in Great Russell Street, London, West Central District, is the growth partly of individual gift, partly of purchase made by Parliamentary grant, partly of material accruing under the Copyright Act of 1842. To the first of these sources it owes the oldest and most valuable portion of its collections; the four libraries which constitute the nucleus of the Museum library are those called respectively the Royal, the Cotton, the Harley, and the Sloane, from their former owners or donors the Hanoverian Kings, Sir Robert Bruce Cotton, Robert Harley Earl of Oxford, and Sir Hans Sloane. Although these and other libraries, the Arundel, Egerton, Lansdowne, etc., are now an integral part of

the national collection, the books and manuscripts are still known, both for deference' and for convenience' sake, by the names of their original owners; and a volume is marked Lansdowne 851, Harley 7333, etc., indicating the collection of which it once formed a part. The classification Adds. (Additionals) indicates a MS acquired by purchase.

Royal. It was not until the accession of the Georges that the purchasing of books became a matter of personal interest > to the Sovereign. When George II, in 1757, transferred his library to the nation, it numbered about 12,000 volumes, 2,000 of which were in manuscript.

The characteristic mark of a MS of this collection is Royal or Reg. (Regum) followed by an Arabic numeral, a letter of the alphabet, and a Roman numeral, indicating case and shelfmarks. Thus, Royal 18 D ii. Catalogue by Casley, London 1734.

Cotton. The Cottonian library far surpasses in value and interest that collected by the English Kings. Sir Robert Bruce Cotton, 1570-1631, who claimed descent from the Bruce of Scotland and cousinship with King James I of England, became involved in political difficulties, and was deprived of his collection by government; the books were however restored to his son, and in 1700 his great-grandson, Sir John Cotton, presented them to the nation. There was at that time no public repository for the collection, and it was stored first in one palace, then in another. In 1731, while it was lying at Ashburnham House, London, along with the King's own volumes, there occurred the famous fire which so seriously injured many of the manuscripts, and destroyed not a few. The unique and priceless copy of the Beowulf, for example, was scorched and mutilated.

The shelfmark of a Cotton MS is noteworthy. The first owner of the MSS kept them in fourteen cases, upon the tops of which were busts of the twelve Caesars and of Faustina and Cleopatra. The volumes were marked accordingly: Cotton Julius B iv, Cotton Cleopatra D vii, Cotton Vitellius A xv, etc. A catalogue of the MSS, by Planta, was published London 1802 folio.

Harley. Robert Harley Earl of Oxford began purchasing in 1705; ten years later he owned 2,500 MSS, and at his death he possessed 6,000, a large part of them valuable for English history. His son the second earl continued the collection, but after his death without issue the first Earl's daughter sold the collection to the nation for £10,000.

The shelfmark is Harley followed by a numeral, Harley 372, Harley 2255, etc.

A catalogue, 4 vols. folio (7639 MSS), by Wanley, Casley, and others, was published London 1808-12.

Sloane. The library of Sir Hans Sloane became the property of the nation in 1753; and an Act of Parliament was then passed providing "one General Repository" for this and the Cotton and Harley collections. Money for the building was raised by a lottery, and Montagu House, now the site of the British Museum, was purchased. No grant of public money was however made for more than fifty years. Then, in 1807, money was appropriated for buying the MSS of Lord Lansdowne; in 1829 the Egerton MSS were bequeathed; the collection of the Earl of Arundel was given by the Royal Society in 1831; in 1846 the Hon. Thomas Grenville bequeathed his magnificent collection of early printed books; and in 1857 the present reading-room was opened to the public.

The British Museum Library contained in 1902 perhaps two million printed books, and about 55,000 MSS.

Access to the national library, with freedom to copy, may be arranged by filling out a form obtainable from the Director of the British Museum. The student must be vouched for by a householder of London, not a boarding-house, lodging-house, or hotel keeper. Explanation of the student's purpose is necessary, as the Museum has not unlimited space at its disposal. The form, when filled out, is deposited in the Museum, and a non-transferable ticket, for three or six months, is issued; this ticket must be shown on demand at the entrance of the Reading-room or of the Manuscript Room. When the student leaves London, this ticket is formally surrendered and put on file; and written application, when further work is desired, is all that is necessary for renewal.

The Bodleian Library at Oxford. The first founder of the University Library at Oxford was Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, the younger brother of King Henry V and the uncle of Henry VI; died 1447. Gloucester, a man of literary enthusiasms, a patron of writers both English and Italian, and a collector, gave to the University, then almost without books, about 600 manuscripts, which were delivered between 1439 and 1446 The catalogue of his gifts may be found in Anstey's Munimenta Academica, Rolls Series, II:758 ff. But owing partly to the lack of proper housing and care, mainly to the iconoclasm of the Commission of Edward VI, all these MSS but three are now gone. See Macray, pp. 8-13.

For particulars regarding Gloucester, his "Italian character”, his share in the Early Renaissance, etc., see the article in the

Dict. Nat. Biog.; Einstein's Italian Renaissance in England, N. Y. 1902; Anglia 27:381 and references there cited, e. g. Warton-Hazlitt, III: 47-52.

About the middle of the fifteenth century a portion of the present library building was erected by the University, Gloucester being a contributor; but by 1560 not only had all the books of the collection disappeared, but the fittings of the library itself were ruthlessly torn out and sold. Near the end of the century, in 1597-8, Sir Thomas Bodley, an Oxford graduate, a successful statesman, and an enthusiast for learning, refitted the rooms built a hundred years earlier, and began a series of gifts of MSS and books continued until his death in 1613. The restored and enlarged reading-room was named from the first founder Duke Humphrey's Library; but the Library as a whole bears the name of its restorer and second founder. Bodley's example as a donor was followed by many others, and, as in the case of the British Museum Library already described, these volumes receive their catalogue mark from their original owners. The principal MS collections of interest to a student of Chaucer, now incorporated in the Bodleian, are the Ashmole, the Bodley, the Digby, the Fairfax, the Laud, the Rawlinson and the Selden. See Macray as cited for notes, and Madan as cited for catalogues of MSS.

This library is poorer in funds than that of the British Museum; its staff is small, its helpers lads, and there is no such supervision of readers as in the Museum. Few reference books are accessible to the reader's hand, as compared with the 20,000 on the lower shelves of the Museum Reading-room; and the insufficient heat and total absence of any lighting arrangements make the wonderful old-world library in some respects an unpractical one. Since the opening of the Radcliffe Camera, or "annex” reading-room, in a closely adjoining building, to which all but the more valuable books may be carried after Bodleian hours, evening work of some kinds may be pursued by the student. Periodicals and most reference books are kept in the Radcliffe. The Library contained in 1902 about 600,000 books and 31,000 MSS. Librarian, E. W. B. Nicholson, M. A.; sub-librarian, Falconer Madan, M. A.

Admission is given upon the written introduction of a resident Master of Arts. An American student without acquaintance in Oxford should apply, if a man, to the Non-Collegiate Delegacy; if a woman, to the Secretary of the Association for the Education of Women at Oxford.

Volumes in the possession of Oxford colleges may in almost any case be used at the Bodleian. The student should first inquire of the Bodleian authorities if the Library will undertake the charge; written application should then be made to the

Librarian of the college in question, explaining the purpose for which use of the volume is desired, and requesting the loan for a specific period. The various colleges differ in their mode of dealing with such a request; in some cases the librarian himself will appear at the Bodleian within twenty-four hours and leave the volume, usually asking to see the student personally. In other cases, the matter must be formally laid before the governing board of the college, and a delay ensues; but the request is almost never refused. When examination of the codex is finished, the student should notify the College librarian. It is advisable that the American student who has but a summer's vacation for work in England should make any requests for loans of MSS before the Colleges close for the summer; for in cases where formal action is necessary, that cannot take place in the absence of members of the College's governing board.

Cambridge: the University Library. Henry Bradshaw, librarian of the University of Cambridge from 1867 until his death in 1886, has summed up in one of his Collected Papers, pp. 181 ff., the state of the Library as he saw it in 1869. He emphasizes the gaps in its history, the losses it has suffered, the miscellaneous nature of its contents, its lack of cataloguing and of classification. Although great gifts have occasionally been made to the Library, it can show no such list of donors as Oxford. For notes upon the peculiar history and organization of the Library see Bradshaw's paper; his own efforts and immense reputation as a bibliographer have done more for the Library than has any single benefactor. The present librarian is Francis J. H. Jenkinson, Esq.

Rye, in his Records and Record Searching, p. 155, has emphasized what he calls the "cramped and illiberal rules" of Cambridge, which require all non-members of the University to be endorsed by two members of the Senate. An American student without acquaintance in Cambridge should address himself, with explanation of the work desired, to Mr. Jenkinson. The mark of a University Library MS is a double letter, followed by a shelf-numeral and by a volume-numeral; thus, Dd iv, 24 or Ii iii, 21.

The college libraries of Cambridge vary as do those of Oxford in their mode of dealing with requests for loans, or for access to their books. The prompt and generous hospitality of Trinity, which has within its own walls every facility for workers, is known to all students; other Cambridge libraries will, in most cases, place their volumes in the University Library for examination, although Corpus Christi and Magdalen, for example, are bound by the strict rules of their benefactors, Archbishop Parker and Samuel Pepys.